


i know you keep your silence

by kusemono (Glitchgoat)



Category: IDOLiSH7 (Video Game)
Genre: Alcohol, Lack of Communication, M/M, Mutual Pining, Unresolved Emotional Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-02
Updated: 2018-10-02
Packaged: 2019-07-23 18:43:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16164659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Glitchgoat/pseuds/kusemono
Summary: 'See? You’re reading too much into it,' one part of Yamato’s brain says.'Or, another part chimes in, 'Ryuu’s latching onto what you proposed, because he’s trying to be accommodating, because he shines like the goddamn sun and'--Wait, what?)“Cool."





	i know you keep your silence

**Author's Note:**

> sometimes, all the matters of the heart are the chaos and the cowardice that keep us apart

Yamato doesn’t initially pay attention when the director announces that the person playing the guest role in the drama they’re filming will be on set. If it’s not Yuki – and he’d know well ahead of time if it had been— he’s generally not too pressed one way or the other about guest roles.

“Hi, Yamato-kun!”

As it is, when he looks up from his phone to 190cm of extremely-familiar Okinawan, beaming like the sun as he raises a hand in greeting, he kind of has to take a moment.

Blink.

Blink.

“Hi, Tsunashi-san.”

Ryuu smiles. “I was excited when I heard I’d be working with you, Yamato-kun. I’m not _really_ the greatest actor, so I hope I don’t hold you or anyone else back.”

Yamato lets one shoulder rise and fall in a half-shrug. “It’s fine,” he says instead of trying to argue the point. “You’ve done fine in everything I’ve ever seen you do.” Even things that weren’t written by absolute gibbering madmen (read: that stupid police drama).

Yamato’s seen more than enough of Ryuu’s acting in dramas (with as much as the majority of his acting plays up the sexy angle? Yes, and also, shut up)— and, furthermore, enough of Ryuu behind-the-scenes to know that he at least has the _potential_ to convincingly act wholly unlike himself. Admittedly, there’s not a whole lot of eroticism in this script (unless Yamato’s missed something and is working with a severely out of date one), so only time will tell if Ryuu’s got any other tricks up his sleeve.

All of these thoughts happen in the span of a fraction of a second, and speaking of other tricks up Ryuu’s sleeve--

“Yeah, but compared to you, I’m barely amateur, Yamato-kun,” Ryuu says.

The immediacy of it paired with the earnestness of the compliment knocks Yamato off his proverbial balance, and less proverbially, makes him chokes on his drink. Ryuu starts hastily apologizing, but Yamato stops him with a wave of his hand as he coughs.

“Thanks, but flattery will get you nowhere,” he says after a moment, tone dry even as water drips inelegantly down his chin. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and swears to prepare himself for this kind of thing in future.

***

Ryuu’s only going to be in a couple of episodes, which means he’ll only be on set for a couple weeks; as such, he wastes no time in ingratiating himself to everyone around him.

It’s – in a development that surprises nobody – a downright delight to have Ryuu on set. He’s gracious and humble and – as Yamato figured he would be – a perfectly-well-skilled actor. They’ve worked together enough, but never just the two of them; without the other members of IDOLiSH7 and Trigger (and, god forbid, Re:vale) around, it’s a very different working experience.

For one, it’s actually pleasant to talk to Ryuu, or at least, be talked at by him. It’s damning by faint praise, perhaps, but compared to getting roped into conversations (and going out of his way to avoid being roped into conversations) by Yuki, it’s practically a godsend.

Yamato half-facetiously wonders if Ryuu’s not going to start showing up with gifts for every extra and bit player at this rate.

Ryuu talks a lot more than Yamato does. That works out fine by Yamato’s reckoning. He’ll ask some small-talk question to nudge Ryuu into talking; if he’s heard from his brothers recently, or how the other members of Trigger are doing (and if he has any embarrassing stories to share, for future reference – if he has any, he does a good job protecting Gaku and Tenn’s dignity), any thoughts on the shooting script.

Yamato only needs to prompt him along; Ryuu’s eager to share.

***

Truth be told, the details of their conversations slip from Yamato’s memory pretty quickly.

He realizes it when he’s taking his glasses off and putting them on his bedside table one night. He stares blearily at the ceiling, hands tucked behind his head, and from somewhere deep in his brain – beyond his contemplations of how loud the _Magikona_ theme must be playing if he can hear it, distantly, from all the way over here in his corner room – he realizes that he doesn’t remember _huge_ swaths of details about what Ryuu actually told him about.

He’s sure he’s going to confuse one weird Okinawan delicacy for another if anyone ever asks him about it, and he can’t keep track of Ryuu’s brothers’ names for the life of him, but does that matter?  Ryuu’s always happy to clarify.

A voice in the back of Yamato’s head says he should pay a little more attention, that eventually Ryuu will catch on that he’s not really paying attention. ( _And then what?_ that voice continues. It’s a tone he’s familiar with, the way his internal monologue tries to build up the fear of being caught out.)

Yamato’s not even sure why he’s not paying that close of attention. It’s not that he doesn’t _care_ , but…

… okay, honestly, he usually _wouldn’t_ care, but the way Ryuu’s face lights up in the most genuine way whenever he gets to explain something makes Yamato give a bit more of a fuck than usual.

It’s not a totally unfamiliar feeling; it’s not unlike the pangs of fondness he feels for the other members of IDOLiSH7. Ryuu _almost_ reminds Yamato of Riku, if Riku were about twice his own size and marketed on his wild sex appeal.

…

Which, admittedly, makes a significant difference in more ways than one.

Dammit.

He decides – with a soft, frustrated groan, as if for the benefit of a nonexistent audience – that that’s more than enough thinking for one night. He very pointedly decides not to pursue the other potential train of thought—the one asking him what, exactly, he’s been focusing on if not the actual conversations.

He’ll deal with that later, and with any luck, “later” will mean “never”. It usually does. He rolls onto his side and doesn’t fall asleep for a good forty-five minutes.

He starts paying more attention, lest the guilt gnaw at him any more than it already does.

***

 “What, you mean you’re _not_ all downing the snake booze on the daily?” Yamato says with a wry smile, leaning back against the wall near the craft services table. Their idle conversation turned from alcohol recommendations, to specifically Okinawan recommendations, to habushu, and Yamato is milking the subject for all its worth.

“No!” Ryuu blurts, half alarmed and half laughing. He puts his hands up, palms facing outwards and fingers splayed out. “I mean, would you?”

“Absolutely,” Yamato says immediately. “You lock eyes with someone, make sure the dead snake in your drink is locking eyes too, and shotgun it. It’s how you establish dominance.” He punctuates this by taking a pointed sip of his bottled water, keeping a remarkably straight face as he does.

“I can’t exactly say that’s high on my list of priorities,” Ryuu says. He looks unsure if he should be alarmed or entertained, and he thankfully seems to lean towards the latter, scratching his cheek with a genuine, if sheepish, smile.

It stirs something that Yamato decides he’s not going to be dealing with, and so he deflects.

“Yeah, I guess not,” he says, looking wistfully into the middle distance. “I mean that stuff is supposed to help with,” he respects himself just enough not to make air quotes, so they’re left implied, “’man problems’, right? You wouldn’t need that, right, _Ero-Ero Beast?_ ”

Ryuu’s ears flush pink. Yamato grins.

***

The more attention Yamato pays, the more he notices that Ryuu very rarely turns the conversation to himself— it’s almost always about other people. His family, Gaku and Tenn, how hard everyone else is working on the set. He has plenty to say about everyone else, but when he has to truly speak of himself, he quickly steers the conversation away after a few humble words.

Yamato doesn’t bring it up.

***

“Hey, Yamato-kun!” Ryuu says, hailing Yamato even as he half-jogs over. Yamato hums an acknowledgement, glancing up from the script he’s barely paying attention to. They’re getting into the swing of things, a few episodes along and miraculously on-schedule; if everything goes as planned, the character Ryuu is playing will be dead by next week.

“What’s up, Tsunashi-san?”

“You’re free tomorrow, right?” Ryuu says, trying to sound casual and failing at it. Yamato blinks owlishly, not quite sure how to respond to that question. Luckily, Ryuu only waits for acknowledgement that he was heard before he presses on, so it doesn’t have the chance to get awkward. “I was thinking we could go drinking after we’re done today!”

Yamato has an immediate and vivid flashback to the first (last) time he agreed to go drinking one-on-one with Ryuu, and he must get a thousand-yard stare without realizing it, because Ryuu instantly starts backpedaling.

“If you don’t want to or you’re busy or something that’s okay, I just thought—”

“Tsunashi-san, you’re fine,” Yamato says in a sigh, putting his hands palms-outwards as if to placate him. “I’ve got something going on tonight, though,” he says, lying through his teeth. It’s a lie; he’s completely free, but something about the idea of getting drunk with Ryuu sounds—

( _really nice?_ )

— completely unpalatable. Not when he’s got all this shit on his mind, not when he’s got enough nascent emotions trying to escape from the locked box into which he’s done such a great job of sealing them.

Case in point: his stomach does a really nasty set of contortions when he watches Ryuu deflate. It’s subtle, but Yamato’s sharp.

“Oh,” Ryuu says, his shoulders falling for a moment before he catches them and hoists them back up. “Well—that’s alright! Just thought I’d offer.”

“Another time, yeah?” Yamato says, desperately hoping that Ryuu won’t ask what he has planned, because he hasn’t managed to think that many steps ahead just yet. He takes a leaf from Ryuu’s book and keeps talking before it has the chance to get awkward. “Maybe some time when Mitsu and Sou are free, too. You can drag Yaotome along, we’ll put the kids in time-out, we can have an adults-only party.”

Ryuu gives him a sort of funny look, but it only lasts a second, and so Yamato doesn’t have the chance to decipher it.  
“Yeah! That’d be fun!” he says, putting on an easy-seeming smile.

***

Yamato grabs a few spare moments between scene blocking to fire off a rabbit chat message.

 **【YAMATO** **】** Manager, quick question

He doesn’t expect an immediate response, but he gets one anyway; apparently, Tsumugi is sitting by her phone.

 **【TSUMUGI** **】** Huh? Is something wrong, Yamato-san?

 **【YAMATO** **】** No (lol)

 **【YAMATO** **】** It’s nothing important, I’m just curious about something

 **【YAMATO** **】** Have you spoken to Tsunashi-san recently?

 **【TSUMUGI** **】**

 **【YAMATO** **】** I’ll take that as a yes (lol)

 **【TSUMUGI** **】** It was nothing important! He just asked me about what all of IDOLiSH7 were scheduled to do the next couple of days

 **【TSUMUGI** **】** Then he apologized for being invasive!

 **【TSUMUGI** **】** Then I apologized if I was being slow to respond because I was trying to think of what everyone was doing—!

 **【YAMATO** **】** Calm down, calm down, I don’t need a full transcript (lol) You told him I was free then?

 **【TSUMUGI** **】** Well—yes! I guess he wanted to ask you to do something…?

 **【YAMATO** **】** Yeah

 **【YAMATO** **】** Nothing major, just wanted me to do him a favor but it was a bit beyond my station so to speak, so I turned him down

 **【YAMATO** **】** Just wondered how he knew I was free, and I got the feeling a little bird might have told him

 **【YAMATO** **】** Or a rabbit, such as it is

 **【TSUMUGI** **】**

 **【TSUMUGI** **】** Nothing gets past you…!

 **【TSUMUGI** **】** Well…! I’m sorry if I put you in an awkward position! I tried not to give away too much sensitive information without being dishonest…

 **【YAMATO** **】** You’re fine

 **【YAMATO** **】** Tsunashi-san’s hard to lie to, isn’t he (lol)

 **【YAMATO** **】** Well, thanks

Yamato pockets his phone without waiting for a reply. He heaves a sigh through his nose. Great.

The director calls him over, and he puts it out of his mind for the time being.

It turns out that Ryuu’s perfectly talkative and sociable – possibly even more than usual – all the rest of the day any time they have the time to exchange words. Yamato wonders if he maybe wasn’t overthinking Ryuu’s offer to go drinking; he is, he thinks, just projecting (-- hold on, projecting _what?_ ). He’s probably— hell, definitely! – just reading too much into Ryuu’s momentary disappointment.  
He thinks this, then remembers the disappointed slump of Ryuu’s shoulders and the momentary confused knit of his eyebrows before he trained them back to normal. He feels something deep and buried in his stomach wrench uncomfortably.

Ryuu really is a better actor than he gives himself the credit for, but like Tsumugi said, not much gets past Yamato.

***

“So, what minor slight crawled up your ass that made you spend the entire night sad-drinking in your room alone?” is the first thing Mitsuki says to Yamato the next morning (read: 11:45 am, so it still counts) when Yamato wanders out in search of coffee.

“I did _not_ spend the entire night _sad drinking,_ ” Yamato says, ignoring the distant throb behind his eyes that proves him a liar. “For all you know, I spent it enjoying some time to myself, totally sober.”

“You didn’t, though,” Mitsuki says, looking over the back of the couch and craning his neck to watch Yamato’s shuffled walk into the kitchen.

“On what evidence? Maybe I spent it _happy_ drinking.”

“ _Drinking alone_ is not _happy drinking_.”

Yamato rolls his eyes, immediately regrets the gesture because it throbs through his head, and then drags himself over to the coffee maker.

“For an old man, you’re a real drama queen.”

“Aren’t you late for kindergarten, kiddo?”

Mitsuki rests the side of his head on his knuckles and shrugs, unfazed. “Look, I know that you’re allergic to talking about whatever’s bothering you.” Beat. “Or, allergic to talking in general, really? Allergic to being direct. Allergic to—”

“I get your point!” Yamato says defensively, and just like he regretted rolling his eyes he regrets raising his voice. He hisses and pushes his glasses up to put pressure on the bridge of his nose. From his vantage point on the couch, Mitsuki grins.

“My point is: if you’re gonna try and drink your feelings away, at least invite me or Sougo so you’re not being a sadsack grandpa on your own.”

“Gee, thanks,” and really, he does appreciate the gesture, but—

“I wasn’t done!” Mitsuki cuts him off sharply. “I was going to say, on that note, Tsunashi-san messaged me last night.”

Yamato wants to crawl into a hole and die, but keeps his mouth shut.

“He asked when the next time that you, me, and Sougo would be free, since you told him you were,” and Mitsuki _doesn’t_ respect himself too much to make air quotes, and so makes them, “’busy’.” Mitsuki fixes Yamato with a pointed look. After a moment, he continues. “I didn’t rat out that your plans were self-pity in the dark, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Yamato doesn’t let his relief show. “I didn’t sad-drink _in the dark_ ,” he says, but Mitsuki is undeterred.

“But. I did tell him we’d all be free tonight once Sougo and Tamaki get home. So. Tsunashi-san and Yaotome-san are coming over later. Maybe not getting totally wasted or anything, but, you know.”

“Isn’t Sou gonna be tired?”

“Already asked him about it,” Mitsuki says, having already accounted for that question. “He seemed pretty enthused about the idea.”

Look, truth be told, when Yamato had offered to give Ryuu a rain-check on the adults-club drinking party, he had _kind of_ been planning on pushing it out further, getting some distance between himself and… whatever the fuck feelings are trying to force their way out of him.

Evidently, Ryuu didn’t let on that his original offer had been a two-man excursion.

( _See? You’re reading too much into it_ , one part of Yamato’s brain says. _Or,_ another part chimes in, _he’s latching onto what you proposed, because he’s trying to be accommodating, because he shines like the goddamn sun and—_

What?)

“Cool,” he says with his teeth behind his tongue.

The next time anyone tells him they got a message from Ryuu, Yamato is going to walk out of the room and into moving traffic.

***

Tenn tags along when Ryuu and Gaku show up that evening, ostensibly – in his own words – to keep the other two members of TRIGGER in line. This is a farce; he vanishes with the rest of the under-20 brigade after the food (delivery, with TRIGGER footing the bill—no complaints there, except possibly from Gaku’s wallet) is gone. Perhaps he didn’t want to be left out; perhaps he had an agenda of his own.

It’s hard to really put any investment into keeping track of Tenn, because Ryuu, when drunk, has a way of occupying the mind.

All it takes is that little tip from tipsy to full-on drunk to systematically and completely destroy Ryuu’s boundaries, and he is on a mission to share his newfound liberation from shame and personal space with everyone around him.

Potentially by force.

 _Frequently_ by force.

Yamato keeps his distance, because he quite likes his ribs un-crushed and his head not covered in alcohol.

Ryuu yells something uproariously in an accent so thick it’s impossible to understand. Perhaps it was some form of warning, because in the next instant, Ryuu throws his arm around Sougo’s shoulders with great enthusiasm. Sougo’s face goes a _fantastic_ shade of red, even redder than his sake was already turning it; he only narrowly avoids sloshing his booze all down his front.

This valiant save is all for naught; Ryuu, in his inebriation, has much less regard for liquid physics than Sougo does. Thanks to Ryuu’s other hand swinging wildly, Sougo gets a not-insignificant helping of Ryuu’s awamori directly on his shirt.

 “I’m so sorry, Tsunashi-san—” Sougo begins, mortified, honest to god about to apologize for the sin of having alcohol spilled on him. _He’s_ still sober enough to feel shame, at least, for however long that lasts.

 “Do you need a towel, Ousaka?” Gaku offers, but he’s drowned out by both Mitsuki laughing his ass off at Sougo’s abject horror, and the fact that Ryuu has decided that now’s the perfect time to bust out a one-man rendition of Secret Night. This serves to make Sougo’s horror even more abject; he looks ready for the earth to open up below him and swallow him.

Yamato finds himself feeling a similar way for wholly different reasons, but he hides it behind a thin smile against the lip of his can of beer.

Yamato decides that Ryuu really doesn’t need him making it weird. (Sougo shotguns the rest of his drink.)

***

They’re not needed on set for a couple days after that, and when they are – that is to say, the next time Ryuu and Yamato cross paths – it’s back to what’s become the temporary normal.

Yamato has had the time to put a little distance between himself and –

_All of that._

… or at least, he thought he did. Then Ryuu greets him, and he feels an uncomfortable, and growing uncomfortably-familiar, swell in his chest. He is probably going to have to deal with this sooner or later, and his way be had, it’s going to be _later_. In a couple weeks, they’ll stop seeing each other quite as much, and it will stop being a problem.

(All this is _really_ making Yamato realize is that if he ever develops any kind of feelings for anyone in IDOLiSH7 – if this is any indication – he is _completely_ fucked unless they stop living together.)

It seems like Ryuu’s back to his baseline, at any rate, so Yamato will just keep it to himself, and it won’t be anyone else’s problem but his own.

***

Anyway, so much for that plan.

“I think you should talk to Ryuu-aniki,” Tamaki says – completely unprompted – a few evenings later, while it’s just him and Yamato in the common area of the dorms. He’s got his feet up on the glass coffee table and Yamato should probably chide him but he’s doing the exact same thing, because Yamato sets a bad example for the childrens.

“What?” Yamato says. It comes out too quickly to sound anything but defensive; he wants to grimace at his own tone of voice, but he keeps any expression off his face through sheer force of will. It’s irrelevant either way, because Tamaki doesn’t even look up from the mobile game he’s tapping away at.

“Well, you’ve been acting sorta funny,” he says, like it’s plain as day, “ever since Ryuu-aniki started filming with you. And you acted all weird the entire time when he and Gakkun came over the other night. _And,_ Tenten said that Ryuu-aniki’s been acting kinda down.” A pause in which he laser-focuses on  his game, and then he resumes speaking. “So. I think he did something that pissed you off or something. And you should talk to him.” He nods to himself, pleased with his own assessment.

Yamato stares blankly at Tamaki, wondering when on earth he found the time or the inclination to take notice of this.

(Actually, he’s not _that_ shocked; if anyone was going to notice, it _would_ be Tama. He’s smarter than he acts, and Yamato wonders if he’s caught on more than he’s _letting_ on, and if he’s just summing it up to _pissed off_ to save Yamato’s ego.)

At least according to Tenn (according to Tamaki, and Yamato already has enough to contemplate without trying to untangle why Tenn told Tamaki this), Ryuu’s been moping. So, pop quiz: is that feeling sinking black and heavy in Yamato’s chest vindication – that he wasn’t overthinking – or is it guilt?

Trick question: it’s both.

Tamaki still doesn’t lift his eyes the entire time that Yamato runs over these possibilities in his mind. The tap-tap-tap of his thumbs on his phone screen is almost deafening in the silence.

 “I’m not acting any funnier than usual, but thanks, I’ll take that advice to heart,” Yamato says in deadpan after a pause just long enough to be awkward. Tamaki doesn’t try to argue the point; Yamato’s not sure if that constitutes a victory or not.

Five minutes later, he thinks he’s home free. He didn’t run off quickly enough to seem like he was leaving in a huff. He stands up and stretches his arms above his head; Tamaki is still absorbed in his game. He replies to Yamato’s _later, Tama,_ with a closed-mouth _mmhm_.

Tamaki calls, “if you need Ryuu-aniki’s number, I have it,” after him.

Yamato briefly contemplates replacing one of the puddings in the fridge with mayonnaise.

***

If Tamaki has noticed, if Ryuu feels or even felt bad about it, then Yamato doesn’t have a choice, right?

( _Sure he does_ , he could just stomp it down like he stomps everything else down, but that doesn’t really feel like the most viable choice in this situation, because for some horrible god-forsaken reason, he _really_ hates the idea of being responsible for Ryuu’s bad mood.)

Maybe he just needs the excuse. There’s a good chance Ryuu won’t be needed on set again after today, so it’s kind of now or never, irrespective of other factors. They were already having a late and long day,

It doesn’t make Yamato feel any less like a creeper when he lingers, waiting for Ryuu to finish talking to everyone who needs something from him. Something drops into in his stomach like a rock when Ryuu catches sight of him, and Yamato catches a half-a-second of unguarded surprise and almost like a flicker of excitement before he catches himself.

“Yamato-kun? I’d have thought you’d be in a hurry to get out of here like usual.”

“ _Usually_ we get done earlier and I’ve got something else to do,” Yamato says. “You got a minute?”

Ryuu blinks a couple times, then glances at his phone—to check the time or to check on his messages (the status of his driver, maybe?), Yamato isn’t sure. “Yeah, of course,” he says, nodding enthusiastically.

Yamato kind of hoped that Ryuu was in a hurry, but it’s too late now. He’s been systematically making this bed for weeks, the time had to come sooner or later to lie in it.

(In. Not about.)

***

“Couldn’t you have driven?” Ryuu asks, following a few paces behind Yamato. The train station isn’t far, but it’s dark.

“Theoretically, yes, but I just don’t like driving,” Yamato says, a well-practiced line. “The driver can’t get drunk.”

“That’s hardly relevant now,” Ryuu says with a smile audible in his voice.

“Yes, but it’s the _principle_ of the thing,” Yamato fires right back over his shoulder, and Ryuu laughs. It’s nice, and the relative silence that follows – punctuated by distant cars and insects and the buzz of street lamps – is almost comfortable.

Almost.

“Did you have something you wanted to talk about, or did you just want company for the walk?” Ryuu asks, breaking that _almost_ into pieces.

Yamato’s mouth suddenly feels kind of dry, but he shrugs one shoulder. He decides there’s no course of action but to just plow forward. “Nothing really important. Just wanted to apologize for bumming you out by flaking on your offer to go drinking.”

He regrets speaking immediately. Ryuu, behind him, sounds a little embarrassed, and it twists that feeling in Yamato’s chest. Yamato looks behind himself, and Ryuu’s shoulders are slumped as his footsteps slow. So as to not leave him in the dust, Yamato slows down as well.

“Aw, man. I thought I’d done a pretty good job of hiding it, too.”

Yamato gives what he hopes is an easy smile. “Apparently, Kujou told Tama, and Tama told me.”

“Ah,” Ryuu says, pitch falling too fast to sound anything but nervous, and he rubs the back of his head.

“Sorry. I just didn’t mean to put you in a bad mood or anything, you know?” Yamato says, unconsciously mirroring the gesture.

“No—no! It’s fine. You were busy—”

“Yeah, but our manager told you I was free, right? Got your hopes up and everything?”

“No, no it’s okay, Yamato-kun!” Ryuu says, smiling in a way that Yamato is learning very quickly is bittersweet, even as he laughs. “It was nothing, I was just a little disappointed. It’s water under the bridge.”

It doesn’t sit right with Yamato; it does nothing to quell the gnawing feeling in his chest. “Right,” he says instead of what he means, and it must be obvious on his face that he doesn’t buy it.

The silence between them stretches for only a few seconds, but it’s suffocatingly heavy. A car alarm goes off somewhere in the distance. They begin to walk again to attempt to ease it; it doesn’t really work.

“… so, Tsunashi-san, are you just saying that to try and be accommodating?” Yamato ventures, tucking his hands into his pockets, and Ryuu’s silence is telling.

“I _said_ I wasn’t that great an actor,” Ryuu says, more to himself than to Yamato; Yamato’s not sure he’s meant to hear it at all, and so pretends he didn’t. Ryuu lifts his voice back to a normal volume when he speaks again. “I wasn’t going to make you—I mean,” he starts and stops again, searching for words. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. I was overstepping myself in the first place, so I didn’t want to make you feel worse for it or push too hard or…”

Ryuu stops, both in his train of thought and in his tracks. Yamato follows suit after a few more steps, turning around with a curious hum.

“Can I ask you a question, though?” Ryuu says once Yamato’s eyes are on him again.

Yamato feels his heart sink, but he doesn’t show it. He shrugs one shoulder. “Yeah. Shoot.”

“Is there a reason you turned me down the first time? I mean-- you don’t have to have one,” Ryuu appends quickly, putting his hands palm-out, “and you don’t have to share if you don’t want to, I just—”

“Tsunashi-san, you’re fine,” Yamato says for what feels like the thousandth time. “Really.” He scratches his cheek. It doesn’t feel like a real option to be honest (it never does), but the idea of lying to Ryuu feels somehow wrong; like the shining light that fills every room Ryuu’s in will expose any lie in an instant, as though even the slightest, most mundane untruths would have no place in the same space as him, shriveling in the sun.

(… right?)

But here they are, standing in the inelegant halo of a flickering street light, no shining sun to be found anywhere unless you’re willing to squint and pretend.

Ryuu waits for an answer that Yamato doesn’t give. He lets go of a deep breath, and nods. “Yeah. Yeah! Well… it’s okay,” he says, fixing a gentle smile on his face again. “I get it.”

Yamato wants to say that it isn’t, but the words die in his throat. “Why’d you ask in the first place?” he says instead. “Just trying to be polite, probably?” he offers, giving Ryuu an out if he wants it.

Ryuu doesn’t take it, and he answers much quicker than Yamato would have.  
“Well, I—I felt bad because I’d talked at you so much,” he says. “I thought maybe you might—you know—” he gestures ineffectually, then his shoulders slump. “It was kind of a dumb idea, I guess, the more I think about it.”

He was worried, even then, about coming across as rude or self-centered. _Goddammit, Ryuu._ Something unpleasantly warm grips at Yamato’s chest, and to distract himself from it--

“Why’d you jump on the chance to drink as a group, if that was your goal, then?” Yamato prompts before he can stop himself, then he immediately flinches at his own bluntness.

Ryuu appears to wrestle with himself for a moment, before he says, “I figured it was better than nothing.”

“Oh,” Yamato says.

_Fuck._

He stares at Ryuu for a second stretched into an eternity, and then words spill unbidden: “Well. Sorry to disappoint. I do that a lot.” He regrets it immediately; his words may as well be daggers for how they effect Ryuu.

“It’s not like that,” Ryuu says softly.

Yamato swallows thickly and pushes his glasses up as he turns away. How’s he supposed to say that _yes it is,_ that he was too busy feeling sorry for himself to see past his own nose or consider Ryuu’s feelings for two goddamn minutes—

So instead of allowing any of that to catch up to him, he shrugs and starts walking.  
Before Yamato can take more than a couple steps, Ryuu closes the distance between them, reaching for and catching his hand.

Yamato can’t find it in him to pull away, stopping dead. He doesn’t turn around.

Ryuu doesn't really seem to have a plan. In the time it takes for Yamato's heart to thump in his ears, Ryuu's hand squeezes his own and then nervously relaxes, pulling away. He doesn’t apologize, but he doesn’t have to.

That horrible feeling surges in Yamato’s chest again (is it really that horri— _yes it is_ ), too-warm and threatening and tangled, wound up so tightly that if Ryuu pulls at it even a little bit more it’s liable to snap. He opens his mouth to speak, and nothing comes out.

“Dammit,” Ryuu mutters.

Yamato chances a glance over his shoulder; Ryuu is running a hand backwards through his hair, mumbling something that Yamato can’t quite make out – is he slipping back into Okinawan?

“Yamato-kun, I—” he begins, much clearer. He starts to reach his hand out, then realizes Yamato is looking at him, and pulls it back like he’s recoiling from a hot stove. “… yeah. Nevermind, I guess.” A heavy pause. He smiles, faint but insincere. “I’ll see you around.”

Ryuu turns away.

Whatever that tangled thing inside Yamato is, it snaps.

“Tsunashi-san, hold on,” he says. Ryuu stops, hesitant; he doesn’t turn around, probably doesn’t dare to be hopeful. Yamato racks his brain for something, anything, useful to say, and all he can come up with—

“Do you want to go get something to drink?”

**Author's Note:**

> happy ryuuyama day !!! i could have written more porn but im a rebel baby !
> 
> tbh i love every yamato ship and every ryuu ship, but i mayyyyy have let on once or twice that 2/10 is my favorite i7 ship, and i wanted to convey some of the reason it's special to me  
> it's not a rarepair by any means but almost everyone who creates content for it isnt an english speaker, so hey come talk to me about it! or any other i7 garbage! on [twitter](https://twitter.com/glitchgoats)! yea!
> 
> also big s/o to [sen](https://twitter.com/sobaya_san) for helping me make the ending not suck


End file.
